Brandenburg Gate

The leaders of East and West Germany opened the Berlin Wall at the Brandenburg Gate today in a tumultuous tribute to the wave of freedom sweeping Eastern Europe. West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl walked through a gap opened by East German army engineers during the night and was greeted by Communist Prime Minister Hans Modrow to the cheers of tens of thousands of Berliners on both sides.

BERLIN - My husband, Alan, and I were on our way from L.A. to Budapest, Hungary - our first trip to Eastern Europe. We had to change planes somewhere, and that somewhere happened to be Berlin, a frequent hub for travel to Northern and Eastern European destinations. We had heard that Berlin was an up-and-coming artists' community, often compared with L.A. Instead of sentencing ourselves to a long layover at the airport, we decided to spend a long weekend in Berlin. We expected three days of prowling contemporary art galleries mixed with sobering visits to historical sites (the Brandenburg Gate, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a glimpse of where the Berlin Wall once stood)

So much for Barack Obama's Kennedyesque moment in Berlin. Obama campaign officials say that the Democratic candidate has decided not to speak at the city's historic Brandenburg Gate, where President John F. Kennedy visited before famously declaring in June 1963, "Ich bin ein Berliner!" ("I am a Berliner!"

Regarding "Items Missing From Luggage" [Letters, March 13]: Never pack anything you cannot afford to be without or lose. On the ground, one of us is always watching our bags. Any purchases of value or that are breakable should be sent home by insured shipping. When it comes to personal theft or loss and security: We divide our money, and each of us carries a different credit card. I carry my wallet in the side pocket of cargo pants and carry part of our money in a front pocket wallet.

The Brandenburg Gate, the Cold War symbol of a divided Berlin, a divided Germany and a divided Europe, was reopened Friday afternoon amid joyous scenes undampened by gray skies, relentless rain and the quickly gathering darkness. The historic, six-columned Grecian-style monument in the heart of the sprawling former capital of the German Empire was overwhelmed by East and West Berliners who swarmed around it, reveling in this long-awaited Christmas gift.

The Berlin Wall will be opened before Christmas at the Brandenburg Gate, the towering monument viewed by many as a symbol of German unity, East German Premier Hans Modrow said today. The announcement followed a meeting between Modrow and West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, during which the two leaders discussed the thorny issue of how to bring the long-divided nations closer together.

Protesters in West Berlin set fires on parts of the Berlin Wall today as about 30 young people on the East German side shouted, "The wall must go!" The West Berlin youths poured flammable liquid on the wall at two locations near the Brandenburg Gate and set the fires. When East German firefighters and border guards arrived to put out the flames, the West German youths threw rocks and chunks of wood at them and yelled slogans condemning the wall. West Berlin authorities arrested one protester.

East German troops took up positions near the Brandenburg Gate tonight, raising hopes that the symbolic heart of divided Berlin might be opened as a border crossing point. The East German news agency ADN denied a West German TV report that the gate would open, and an East German police officer told reporters: "Go away, nothing will happen here yet." But East Berlin's Communist authorities said negotiations were going on, increasing belief on the Western side that the opening was imminent.

Neo-Prussianism should be spotlighted as much as neo-Nazism ("East Germans Warned of Neo-Nazism," Part A, Dec. 28). Already East Germans are demanding return of parts of former Prussia now in Poland. Union with the European Community at Strasbourg is the road to the future. Reunion of the Germanys through the Brandenburg Gate is the road back to a bloodstained past. RICHARD CASTELAR SIMONSON Washington, D.C.

This hardly seems an appropriate "point in time" (to coin that old familiar phrase) for the President to resort to his well-worn moral indignation routine, as he did in his speech at the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin. A generous dose of hypocrisy was supplied as Reagan attempted a sanctimonious lesson in democracy for the Russians, while at home, the Iran- contra committees continued to learn just how close to a totalitarian style his Administration came in conducting its foreign policy.

I had two goals before I booked my flight to Europe: Get the lowest price, and travel with the fewest stops possible. Air Berlin offered the best fare, but little did I know its name would be so prescient. For the first trip outside the country with my 7-year-old son, Carpenter, I had planned a monthlong itinerary that started in Rome and proceeded to Bologna, then Venice, Copenhagen and London. Berlin was not on the docket. At least it wasn't until we got to LAX and, with two hours to kill at the gate, met another single-mom-and-son traveling combo who was moving to Germany's capital.

We were on our way to see the Brandenburg Gate when they came unexpectedly into view across the street — rows of muted gray concrete slabs of varying heights, their rise and fall taking up an entire city block. The sight stopped us in our tracks. "That must be the Holocaust Memorial," I said. "It can't possibly be anything else," said Jon, my husband. As a Jew, I always have mixed feelings when visiting such places. I am repelled by the horror they represent yet drawn to them for the recognition they offer.

Irish rockers U2 returned to Berlin for a free mini-concert Thursday in front of the Brandenburg Gate, playing its classic singles and a duet with Jay-Z even as the show was obscured from public view by a nearly 6 1/2 -foot- high metal barrier. Bono greeted the crowd with the German words "Berlin, Du bist wunderbar!" (Berlin, you are wonderful!) and the band played a 30-minute, six-song set that featured "Sunday, Bloody Sunday," "One" and "Beautiful Day." The show, free to 10,000 ticket holders who snapped up the tickets online last week in just three hours, drew controversy because of the barrier surrounding the gig. Both Berliners and tourists alike saw the irony in building a wall around a concert dedicated to the wall that already has come down.

One thing does lead to another. Last spring, I was obsessed with cleaning my garage; a week later, I had scheduled a trip to Berlin. As I admired my handiwork, I eyed an old cedar chest along one wall, and I realized I hadn't looked inside since 1988. I hadn't wanted to. After all, it was filled with mementos of my husband, Jerry, who died in 1987 when he was a reporter for the Los Angeles Times. But now I was curious; I couldn't remember what was in it. Surely, it was long enough to brave the memories.

He has drawn record-breaking crowds to rallies all over the United States. But it took a trip to Germany for Barack Obama to attract his biggest audience of all: More than 200,000 people packed into a central Berlin park on Thursday to hear Obama call for closer ties between Europe and America. The sea of people in Tiergarten, Berlin's central park, stretched a full mile, from the Victory Column where Obama spoke to the historic Brandenburg Gate. Obama's rhetoric was no less sweeping.

So much for Barack Obama's Kennedyesque moment in Berlin. Obama campaign officials say that the Democratic candidate has decided not to speak at the city's historic Brandenburg Gate, where President John F. Kennedy visited before famously declaring in June 1963, "Ich bin ein Berliner!" ("I am a Berliner!"

East German border workers began dismantling the Berlin Wall at the historic Brandenburg Gate on Thursday night to make a new crossing point between East and West Berlin. Shortly after 10 p.m., a crane began lifting the cylindrical concrete sections from the top of the wall and a worker with a pneumatic drill started demolishing part of it.

Too much money concentrated in too few hands could spell the death of soccer, Gerhard Aigner, the retiring chief executive of UEFA, told a German newspaper Sunday. "We have a dangerous situation, because it should not be that success is only possible with money," Aigner told Welt am Sonntag. "If that ... remains the case, then football will lose credibility and fascination. "Sport needs competition [and] interesting opponents, otherwise boredom sets in and no one wants to come to the games anymore.

The men in yellow slickers worked in the autumn rain, climbing on scaffolding, above stonemasons and architects, through the veiled columns and beneath the bronze chariot of this city's most enduring monument, where Michael Pauseback looked history in the eye and proclaimed: "The gate is ready." After two years of being scoured of grime and draped in tarps, the Brandenburg Gate will show its newly buffed face to the world today as Germany celebrates Unification Day.